literature.

Colonist, Issue 75, 9 July 1858, Page 4

literature.

A SPECIMEN OF COLONIAL CRITICISM

[From the Melbourne Examiner.)

A VICTORIAN NOVEL. Reginald Mortimer; or, Truth more strange than Fiction. A Tale of a Soldier s Life and Adventure. By H. Butler Stoney, Captain 40th Regiment. Melbourne: Fairfax and Co.

Lunacy ? It is nothing half so good. A lunatic sometimes says and does very clever things, unreasonable, erratic, incoherent though they be. Somebody has said that the dividing line between insanity and poetic fervor is undefinable, and it would be therefore uncomplimentary and unjust to themaniac to attribute to a "diseasedwit" this now-completed book of "Reginald Mortimer." It has neither wildness nor frenzy in it: it is neither brilliantly absurd nor grotesquely ludicrous: it is simply intolerably stupid and inconceivably inane. It is therefore contemptible, and under ordinary circumstances might be passed by with indifference, as beneath notice and unworthy of comment; but there are some considerations to be taken into account which forbid that we should pass upon it so summary a judgment. First, we, as patriotic lovers of this our adopted country, are desirous of possessing the good opinion of the world which exists outside the boundaries of this south-eastern corner of the Australian continent. It has gone forth to all people that we are a community of progress; that, materially, morally, and socially, we are eagerly reaching forward to excellence; and that in much of what belongs to our happiness and prosperity we exhibit a wonderful forwardness. It is believed, and with much truth, that we have emerged from the confusion into which we were plunged six years ago, and that, in place of arbitrary incapacity for- public rule, we have an able and constitutional Government; that for deplorable make-shifts we have domestic comforts; that we have exchanged ill-constructed huts for substantial houses; that our amusements are refined where they used to be coarse and crude; and that bush-carpentery has been displaced by mechanical skill. And shall it be believed that with all this progress, we have advanced nothing in our literature ? but that " Reginald Mortimer" represents our book-fashioning? Heaven forbid,

We have been endeavoring to discover what possible motive has moved the author of this so-called " tale." Some men write for profit, some wish to amuce the world, and a good many have a sincere desire to instruct their fellow-creatures. If " Reginald Mortimer" has been profitable, we marvel; that it is not amusing, we are full certain; and if any persons have been instructed by it, it must be those who have only just learned to read, and have never seen any other book.. We can only suppose, therefore, that the miserable vanity of seeing himself in print could have inspired the author to make such a melancholy exhibition of his ignorance and incapacity. But vanity is not a crime, and if this were the only offence with which he is charged, very strong condemnation might disarm itself; but when inflated conceit is to be gratified at the expense of other people, and when the public is deluded into paying for the amusement of a man who can make no return for this disbursement, then, we insist.-it becomes necessary to protest and exclaim against so reprehensible a piece of imposition. Twelve separate shillings have we expended for twelve separate numbers of the rankest rubbish, the most undiluted balderdash, that it was ever our misfortune to be compelled to read. But the thing is not merely unattractive, it is not simply devoid of interest, wanting in consistency, plot, situation, contrast, vividness of description, aptness of illustration, smartness of expression or point; but, worse than all this, it outrages in almost every page some of the commonest rules of grammar. It is not English. It is a ruthless mutilation of respectable words and phrases, and an unmerciful overworking of others, which are made to do fifty-fold duty. There are some books in which the absence of a rigid adherence to elegance and propriety of expression may be excused on the ground that the matter is valuable. Such are books of science written by practically wise but unlearned men. Such would be, perhaps, a colonial story in which stirring events should be narrated, or real scenes described, by an eye-witness whose quickness of apprehension, readiness of observation, and warmth of imagination were not accompanied by an acquaintance with a correct style, or a familiarity with lexicographic niceties. It is jt. commonplace account of commonplace incidents (with here and there an improbable one, introduced by way of communicating piquancy) occurring in the course of the life of an amiable and excellent but still commonplace individual, who may,-or may not, have existed in reality; and the story is narrated in a style which is at once forced, silly, and bombastic. We do not pretend to deny that commonplace events may be interesting to the particular friends of the individual of whose experience they form part, or that extraordinary events happening to an extraordinary person may derive interest from this association; but here we have a succession of circumstances narrated in the most wearisome manner, whilst the subject of them is neither a particular friend of ours, nor known at all to the world.

But if we are to accept in real earnest the declaration of the author that this tale is the subject of a private diary bequeathed to him by the writer, then, as it seems to us, has there been a most unpardonable violation of the sacredness of trusting friendship; "for," says the author at page 49, " ours is not, nor pretends to be, a tale of high-flown picture and romance, but a truthCul story culled from a journal never intended when written for another's eye."

Mark that, if you please. We _ should think that common respect for the memory of the deceased ought to have consigned this journal to the obscurity of manuscript, or at least have limited the circulation of the printed form to the friends of the writer; but no! a foolish vanity is to be gratified, and, worse still, money must he made out of it if possible; and so, rubbish as it is, it is yet dribbled out a few pages at a time, by way of bringing it the oftener before the world, and its issue is made the opportunity for advertising; so private friendship gives way to the more utilitarian principle of pecuniary profit, thus verifying the old proverb that "it is no use having friends unless you make use of them." But we are willing to believe that the story of the bequeathed manuscript is an invention of the author, and thus exonerated from the charge of indelicacy and want of feeling, we will accept the book as a work of imagination. Did we say imagination ? We beg the author's pardon for accusing him of a quality which there is no evidence whatever that he possesses. Imagination! indeeed; why, every incident described "has its parallel in better-written books; every sentiment expressed is but the idea of'another person put into more clumsy and more feeble language; and every precept inculcated is only some very hackneyed moral truism met with in a hundred different forms. We could readily imagine Murray's handbooks, and some of Lever's novels, with pilferings from Theophile Gautier and others, spoiled in the process, had supplied the whole of the material for the story.

But admitting, as we most readily do, that there is but little originality to be met with anywhere in the world at the present day, what shall be said of the grammar ? What shall be said of such sentences as— " The difference in the prices vary ? " " A flourish of trumpets and drums generally announce the commencement of the spectacle ;" " a clapping of hands from the audience intimate a wish;" " each have a squib at the end;" "to be allowed to marry one to whom she had been so many years attached to;" " they being equally indignant with, his perseverance;" " a hack-ground of high mountains rise from the outskirts;" "a splendid group of waving willows now shade the spot;" " a grove of shaded poplars seem to burst from the mountain;" "the others whom, I see, are in the United Kingdom;" " a couteaux-de chasse;" " a fine line of quays and wharfs (no such plural as wharves, of course), extend along the front of the city !!" We ask what shall be said of these grammatical exactnesses? not to speak of such elegant construction of sentences as :—" Proceeding along the via Sacra is the large, monastery; * * * * Passing this appears before you the most splendid ruin of Rome—the Colloseumf (New mode of spelling this word.) Again at page 135, "the portion of the palace they occupied was surrounded by a beautiful garden, of roses, whose perfume filled the air; this [i.e., the perfume] extended to the battlements overhanging the sea, another portion looked (we did not knowperfumes had eyes) upon the main square." Our author would pass for a linguist, and so he mixes up impossible French and peculiar Spanish— e.g., "He proceeded to the office of the Procurator dv Roy, where the passport was vis-a-vis d."

He thinks repetition an advantage, so he uses the same word a dozen times in the course of a page, or gives the same sentence twice over, as at page 27, where he says, "in true sailor style he carelessly strolled down the street, and left the city unnoticed and unknown." " Young and active, he strolled carelessly along."

He thinks poetic words and phrases an ornamentation, and so whenever the word over ha» to be used he contracts it into o'er, and writes "know you not" for don't you know; "aught," for anything; "wending his way," for going about, his business; "pause we a moment," for wait a bit; " the ruby tints of the setting sun warned our hero to speed more quickly," for, it began to grow dark, and he.thought he had better push along; " the shades of evening had now closed in," for, it was-getting late ; " return we now to our hero," for, 111 tell you something more about him ; " great was the master's surprise," for, he was rather astonished. Whenever anybody takes leave of anybody else, it is a " tearing" of himself away. A good understanding is spoken of as a " revelling in the mutual happiness of mutual confidence," and " Deep was the grief of her thunderstricken listener," means that the account rather annoyed him. Here and there is to be found extraordinary information on different subjects; for instance, in describing the bulls at a bullfight, we are told that "some are rash and intrepid—some are wary and cautious," and.that "the men are very skilful, but they often fall a victim to the enraged animal." The ship in which Reginald escapes from Spain is described as being " chiefly laden with oranges for the Dublin market." It may be interesting to know that oranges are exported from that country, but as the circumstance in this particular notice of it has not the slightest bearing upon anything else, it would have been quite as germane to the subject if the author had stated the price at which they were selling just then. The next paragraph informs us that the "barometer is the sailor's never-failing guide," and the next following that "There is ever a certain heartiness and fellow-feeling among sailors." A few lines beyond that—"Few indeed know, or can know, all that they go through." A little further and we come upon the discovery that, " of all the ills that either the sea or land tossed [what is that like ? earthquakes, we should think] wanderer has to endure, there is none more trying to the patience or none more severe than the want of water." The gender of a halt, is decided at page 36, where we read —"The captain, with his party, lashing themselves to the pump, worked hard for a considerable time in the hope of discovering the leak, or at least keeping her afloat,

until the wished-for land appeared." This pumping, by the way, is found to be somewhat fatiguing^ and the circumstance is impressed upon the mind of the reader by repetition, for on one page we are told that " Distressing toil at the pumps wore them out," and on the next we read, " Worn out by fatigue from laboring at the pumps." Notwithstanding this fatigue, however, the 3'ouns gentleman of whose life and adventureslhe tale professes to be a record, becomes sleepy, and this fact is also made impressive by being twice related, for'at the fourth line on page 38 it begins, " Toil, hunger, and thirst were alike forgotten, as he slumbered on;" and nineteen lines further we have the iteration, " Cold, hunger, and thirst seemed alike forgotten for the moment." At page 44 there is the new and startling truth, " Necessity, it is »aid, is the mother of invention."

Perhaps it would have been well if the author had published a glossary and notes, for there are not only several perfectly new words introduced, such as " romanticity," " reciprocality," and the like, but some of the sentences are so utterly unintelligible that a translation is indispensable. What, for instance, is the meaning of, "her more unsophisticated nature, more increased and excited by the many dreams of the future drawn to her by her devoted, attendant ?" We can understand drawing a bill, or a plan, or-a badger, or a pint of ale, or even amoral; but drawing a dream is quite a new process. feo also we ask, in all simplicity, what is meant by "neither could disguise their mutual ties of more than friendship's bearing that bound them?" or, " Reginald found himself acknowledged as a member of the family by a chain of circumstances that seemed almost incredible ?"

But why go on making selections from such a mass of unendurable absurdity? Open the book where you will, miserable ignorance and stupidity stare at you from every page. The thing is an insult to a reading community, and if such bastard abortions -are to be received and tolerated, and a literary reputation to be founded thereon, every man of sense who has ever taken pen in hand had better forthwith abandon his calling, and take to more respectable occupation. It is no excuse that the book has been written in the colony, and that therefore it should be encouraged as a colonial production. On the same principle should we encourage the manufacture of electro-plated leaden nuggets, or assert that bales of gumleaves should be exported as packs of wool. We shall be a laughing-stock and an object of derision, not only in England, but in the contiguous colonies, if we permitted such books as " Reginald Mortimer" to go forth to the world as samples of our native literature; and it is for this reason that we have felt it our duty thus earnestly and vehemently to protest against it. Simple contempt will not suffice. In England the book might have been passed by unnoticed, and left to take its place among the tons of waste-paper which (Scott and Dickens though it be as compared with " Reginald Mortimer,") yearly issue from the press; but this colony has yet to make its reputation as to literature, and it becomes the duty, therefore, of those who are in earnest about their adopted country's interest jealously to guard against the acquirement of a bad name at the outset of its career. Better any reputation than that of incapacity. We had almost said that it were better for us to be immoral than foolish, and that we would prefer a colonial Paul de Kock to a man who can write only such stuff as we have been considering.

Execrable, however, as is this book, we should, perhaps, have been less unsparing in our criticism if it had the negative merit of being an anonymous production; but inasmuch as it is not only boldly acknowledged, but is proclaimed as the third work by the same hand, there is all the greater need that our voice should be raised against it, especially as there has not been, as far as we know! a protest declared in any other quarter. We have thought to attempt an epitome of what, by a considerable stretch of the imagination, may be presumed to be the story, but the labour of wading through such a swamp of rubbish has been already more than sufficient to try our patience to the utmost, and we fervently thank Heaven now that we have arrived at the end of the last chapter. Let justice be done. It occurs to us that the rolume may be useful after all; it may serve as a school-book of bad English for the purpose of furnishing " examples for correction." As to ourselves, we already made use of it, and we can strongly recommend it as excellent shaving-paper.

A report has been drawn up by Dr. Lyon Play fair on the state of the Institution in Southampton-buildings, London, the parent and model of the Mechanics' Institutions. It was fouuded in 1820 by some of the most distinguished authors of the new movement, and reckons a progeny of 600 imitators. In 1836—that is, 13 years after its foundation—it had 1234 subscribers. From that date, however, it has continually declined, with scarcely a glimpse of a revival, and last December the subscribers had sunk to 436. The receipts have sympathised with this downfall, and the annual excess of expense is about £200. There is now an accumulated debt of £4000, and the institution is in that hopeless state that, unless Parliament or the public, or both do something, for it, and unless, as a condition of this aid, the classes be put on a better footing and other suggestions be attended to, the Parent Institute of England, to the immense disgrace of the cause, to the great discouragement of science, and injury of the workingclasses, is threatened with| insolvency and ruin.

It is reported that Mr. Charles Kean is to be forthwith knighted.

It is said that the Prince de Joinville is about to publish his voyages and scientific observations.